Goodes just wants to bring out the best in all Australians

How will you mark Australia Day? Good luck to you, says Adam Goodes, if you are among the thousands who will pass the day waving the national flag with one hand while keeping the other free to plunge into a well-stocked Esky.

''That's what I love about Australia,'' says Goodes, the Sydney Swans player and Australian of the Year. No matter where we come from, not matter our culture, we are free to practise our beliefs, to live the way we choose.

Excuse Goodes, however, if he does not join in the more excessive displays of chest-beating, beer-swilling nationalism. As Goodes puts it: ''It's a very sad day for a lot of our mob.''

By his mob, he means indigenous Australians. For all he loves about his country, and for all his innate optimism, Goodes cannot help but reflect on the sorrow that has shadowed successive generations of indigenous Australians since Governor Arthur Phillip staked the flag of the British empire at Sydney Cove on January 26, 1788.

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We should all spare a little time to reflect with Goodes. That does not mean slumping morosely into a pit of collective shame. It does not mean a day of wailing. But it does mean stopping to think. It does mean that while we celebrate all that is good about Australia - and there is much to relish - we should also consider our shortcomings, the things we are yet to get right.

Our unfinished business is far from limited to the plight of indigenous Australians, but this remains among our most urgent missions as a nation. Efforts to close the gap with non-indigenous Australians on infant mortality, life expectancy, education, employment and incarceration rates - despite the billions of dollars invested, and despite some advances - have produced a pitiful scorecard.

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After years of employment growth for black Australians, the proportion of working-age indigenous people in full-time jobs fell from 48.2 per cent in 2008 to 45.9 per cent last year. Aboriginal students remain more than two years behind their peers in maths, science and reading. One in seven indigenous people could expect to spend some time in jail when the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody delivered its findings two decades ago. Now it is one in four. Indigenous Australians account for 26 per cent of prisoners but only 2.5 per cent of the population.

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Goodes is not the despairing kind. He prefers to make a difference. He does that with his cousin and former AFL star Michael O'Loughlin and their foundation, which offers role models and the promise of a better life to young indigenous people.

Goodes cares deeply about all young people, black or otherwise. He demonstrated this last year when a 13-year-old girl in the crowd at the MCG called him an ''ape''. Goodes' response was to ''cut this girl some slack'', to reason she was one who needed support.

It was a potent moment. He opened eyes. He started a conversation about racism.

Goodes is doing it again. He's starting a conversation about making Australia a better place. What could be more patriotic than that? Goodes believes in our better angels. Let's believe with him.